


tame/wild

by pr0serpina



Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Anxiety, Body Worship, M/M, Porn With Plot, Post-War, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-10
Updated: 2020-06-10
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:15:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24637438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pr0serpina/pseuds/pr0serpina
Summary: I have loved you in a tame way, and I have loved you wild.When confronting anxiety, Trapper needs to feel alive.  Hawkeye needs to know he's the one doing it.
Relationships: "Trapper" John McIntyre/Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce
Comments: 2
Kudos: 40





	1. tame

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nowhiteflaguponmydoor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nowhiteflaguponmydoor/gifts).



His hands shake sometimes. Maybe there’s a pattern: things go to complete shit, his hands shake. He drinks too much, they shake. He leaves a fight, they shake. Never when it counts, when that tremor, that failing of psychology, would have dire consequences. And for that he is grateful, even if it means fumbling with his shirt buttons constitutes a workout right now. 

He smokes sometimes, a disgusting habit he tells himself he’ll quit tomorrow. It’s a miracle he doesn’t set his trembling fingers on fire. The hot smoke contrasts nicely with the frigid air coming off the river, but his lungs burn with way. He forces himself to breathe deeply. Slow. Calmer. 

His fingers twitch on the porch railing, and he thinks of the scotch in the cabinet—honey-smooth and the color of his eyes. But he’d bought it for celebrations. The temptation is as present as it is dark, and he forces himself to turn his thoughts away. He finds the idea of a drink after a long day unbearable now; the scent of gin makes his stomach roil in peacetime. 

He feels the tremor coming back and wonders if a shower would help, but the thought exhausts him, and his hands are raw already from so much scrubbing, the flesh inflamed and tender. Hawkeye will tut at them in the morning but rub cream into them all the same. 

He makes the decision to creep into Hawkeye’s bedroom, quivering fingers slipping on the doorknob. Moonlight brighter than a beacon floods the room, falling over Hawkeye’s sleep-slackened face and turning his hair silver. He stands barefoot on the cold wood and breathes. Aftershave. Dusty books. Lemon polish. Better. He sidles into bed beside Hawkeye, who’s fallen asleep with his glasses on again. He gently leans across Hawkeye’s back and wiggles the tortoiseshell frames loose. 

His hand finds its way to Hawkeye’s warm side, stroking the soft bare flesh there. Hawkeye stirs. “John?” he asks drowsily, and John’s charmed by it—as if it could be someone else. 

“Sorry,” John croaks. “I just....” He needs to feel something alive under his hands today.

Hawkeye leans back, pulling John’s hand against his beating heart. The warmth of it thrums under John’s fingers, and he breathes. Sweat. Hawkeye’s soap. Life. “I love you,” he breathes against Hawkeye’s ear. 

Hawkeye squeezes his hand. “I know,” he whispers. 

The tremor in his hand abates. 

John blinks awake in the soft sunlight. It’s far earlier than he’d planned to wake. He feels fatigue trying to pull at his limbs, but he remembers to breathe. He’s in control of himself now, he thinks. Hawkeye lays in his arms, face smoothed and sweetened by sleep. John lets himself watch, indulges himself in a way that still feels brand new. The instinct to pull himself away is strong; as wakefulness comes, so does a simmering self-contempt. He’s better than this. He’s seen so much worse, so much more than he saw last night, and he never faltered. He never shook like a scared kid. But he’s been here before. He closes his eyes. The times he pulls inward make it so much worse for the condemnation and hurt in Hawkeye’s pretty gaze. Hawkeye never says anything to him about it, though by rights, he can and should, but when John pretends nothing happened, it’s almost a kind of betrayal.

But he never makes John talk, either, and John’s grateful. He’s come far, if he says so himself, but not that far. Affection wells in the pit of his stomach, and he brushes his lips against the space between Hawkeye’s sooty eyebrows.

Hawkeye rolls over away from John, who takes an opening when it presents itself: Hawkeye’s a painfully light sleeper, but John feels he can slip out of bed without stirring him now. He pads to the kitchen, turning the radio on low and pulling eggs, milk, bread, and butter out of the fridge. He cracks the eggs one-handed, splashes in some milk, sprinkles some sugar. Butter melts in the frying pan and water hisses in the percolator. This is something he can do.

The floor creaks under Hawkeye’s heavy footfalls. John hears him yawn exaggeratedly behind him a beat before Hawkeye’s arms circle his waist. “Summertime and the living is easy,” Hawkeye croons in his ear, pressing a kiss against his neck. “Is that real, un-freeze-dried coffee?”

John hums and leans back into the touch. “French toast, too, if you ask nicely. It ain’t your dad’s, but it beats cold eggs.”

Hawkeye chuckles in delight. “You’re sweet sometimes.”

John flushes in embarrassment. “Don’t tell anyone; I gotta reputation to maintain.”

“Oh, yes—John McIntyre, formerly known as Trapper, stone-cold skirt-chaser and heart-breaker, making his lover breakfast at this very moment, who, in point of fact, doesn’t wear skirts, but I could if you thought you were into that kind of thing,” Hawkeye waggles his eyebrows. John shoots him a glare. It’s mostly devoid of heat, but it sparks a little guilt in him that he tamps down firmly. Mentioning the nature of their relationship doesn’t really bother him anymore. 

Because it’s not just a relationship anymore, is it? It’s their life. Their life is Hawkeye doing the crosswords in pen and accidentally jamming his elbow into John’s spleen every night, separate rooms for the occasional disparate shifts and to keep up appearances when his girls visit that they never otherwise use. Hawkeye singing in the shower and kissing the back of his neck when he comes up behind John. Hawkeye remembering the cigars he likes and leaving a light on when he works the night shift and holding his hands when they shake and not asking questions.

Hawkeye snaps his fingers in front of John’s face. “Hello? Asleep with your eyes open again?”

John blinks and comes back to himself. “Sorry, just thinking.”

“Penny for them?”

“You’d be overpaying. Outta my way, honey, or I’ll burn the toast.” He shoos Hawkeye away, ignoring his mutters that if not for him, the toast would be burnt anyway. He flips the French toast neatly, jiggling the handle of the frying pan in a way that’s maybe showing off, just a little. He feels the rush of chilly air that accompanies Hawkeye getting the paper off the stoop. He pours the coffee and plates the toast, leaving it bare for Hawkeye to desecrate with half a pint of syrup, and comes up behind Hawkeye to set the dishes before him. He peers over Hawkeye’s shoulder—predictably, Hawkeye had flipped through the paper to find the crossword—and impulsively bends down, wrapping his arms around Hawkeye’s perpetually and annoyingly slender frame.

Hawkeye reaches up with one arm, snaking it around John’s neck and humming a little in contentment. John kisses his temple lightly. He’s still not great with words like “thank you” and “I love you,” but this he can do: he can make breakfast, kiss his lover, and not run away.


	2. wild

Hawkeye needs to bring something to life under his hands.

He catches John in a kiss that sears both of them. John jolts in surprise at the sudden heat, and Hawkeye can feel him pushing back a little, testing to see whether he can take control.

The answer this time is a resounding no.

He urges John toward the nearest bed, fiddling with buttons as he goes. John reaches to undo Hawkeye’s, but he slaps his hands away. “Not yet,” he murmurs against John’s parted lips. “I need…”

“Yeah?” The hazel bleeds out of his dilated eyes. “Whaddaya need?”

Hawkeye shakes his head, clearing it a little. “I need to take care of you. Let me?” It’s a gamble; John’s not always obliging. Hawkeye feels him hesitate, but he nods, undoing his belt swiftly.

He loves John every which way, but he truly, truly loves John when he’s like this: on his back beneath Hawkeye, letting himself be undressed, stroked, kissed. Treasured. Spoiled, even. As much as Hawkeye would like to get down to business with the kind of brutal efficiency that would soothe the itch of adrenaline in his body, he forces himself to slow down. John deserves to be worshipped if he’ll allow it.

So he indulges—really, he’s indulging himself, if he’s preemptively invoking the honestly he will feel in the morning that will bring him crippling shame—and savors the feel of John’s skin beneath his fingers. Still annoyingly quarterback-trim, even if he thinks he’s putting on weight, and with honey-colored hair that doesn’t go gray, only fades slightly. Hawkeye has borne witness to John’s preserved ability to render nurses knock-kneed and tongue-tied. He’s borne witness to John’s ability to bring him to his knees with little more than a gaze and a crooked finger.

But he can give as good as he gets tonight, every bitten-off sigh from John erasing the failing monitors attached to the kid he’d failed to save tonight. He licks at John’s exposed neck, tasting hints of sweat and cheap soap, feeling his sharp intake of breath. Hawkeye is shocked he hasn’t broken and begged for the show to go on. He wonders if he could make him.

He uses his ostensibly healing hands, the slim and strong hands he’s so vainly proud of, to tweak at John’s nipples, scratch his chest sharply, tease the unbearably soft skin between his hips. John tilts his hips minutely, but doesn’t demand—much like Hawkeye doesn’t question why John’s picked up smoking and can’t stand to be called ‘Trapper’ anymore, John doesn’t question why sometimes Hawkeye needs to fuck with a maniacal and borderline ruthless streak.

Much as he’d love to close his lips around the head of John’s pretty leaking cock, he’s more curious to see if John will let him get his fingers in him. He hitches up one of John’s legs and strokes the tight skin under his balls, eyebrows raised in question. There’s a beat, two beats, and John flings the lube from the bedside table at him. He slicks up, and it hits him for the first time that he’s still fully clothed. He’s too keyed up, anxious, and upset to be able to get anything out of this physically, doubts he could even get hard, but knowing that he has the power to do this to John and that John allows it is doing wonders for him mentally. 

He eases in slowly, gently, giving steady pulls to John’s cock to distract him and help him relax. John muffles himself with a fist pressed against his mouth as the finger becomes two, stretching gently and prodding for the spot that will make John bite his own knuckles. He knows he’s found it when John jerks against him, hips instinctively angling and arching for more contact. It’s sloppy—Hawkeye’s two hands refuse to cooperate in a matching time and the angle is killing his wrists, but as he pulls one hand away from John’s cock, leaning on his free elbow to watch him as he fucks him with the other hand, John’s cock doesn’t flag.

John’s always been quiet during sex. He doesn’t breathe that he’s close or moan like a whore; being on the receiving end of dirty talk tends to embarrass him, and he usually keeps his eyes closed. But they’ve been together long enough that Hawkeye knows his tells, feels how his hips become uncoordinated as he fucks himself on Hawkeye’s fingers, watches him bite his bottom lip and tilt his head back. It’s why it surprises him all the more when John meets his eyes and whispers his name as he spills in sticky strands over his belly.

Hawkeye shudders as if he’s the one who’s just come while he gently fucks John through his, pulling away when John starts twitching from too much stimulation. He cleans them up with John’s discarded undershirt and discards his own clothes before flopping in bed next to John. John languidly rolls over, wrapping an arm around Hawkeye’s middle and resting his head in the crook of his neck. He’s so sweet after sex. “Feel better?” he asks, voice low and lazy, accent thick.

“Yeah,” Hawkeye says quietly. “I love you,” he adds, not as an afterthought, but because it’s suddenly vitally important that John know this, that Hawkeye say it, because he will be low and full of loathing tomorrow when he revisits this night and thinks about how he fucks the person he loves to make himself feel better.

“I know,” John says easily, and he does. And he will reassemble the pieces of Hawkeye that will break apart in the morning, not asking questions that Hawkeye can’t answer, and Hawkeye will love him then, too.

**Author's Note:**

> This one's for @nowhiteflaguponmydoor, who did something super cool and I'm really proud of her. And for @justalittlegreen for being a perennial cheerleader.
> 
> Title from "Seven Bridges Road," with my apologies to Steve Young.


End file.
